


Common Sense

by Rubyrose0736



Category: Pitch Perfect (Movies)
Genre: F/F, HSAU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-13
Updated: 2016-06-06
Packaged: 2018-06-08 03:25:51
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,054
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6837163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rubyrose0736/pseuds/Rubyrose0736
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An HSAU</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The People

**Author's Note:**

> So if this sounds familiar it's because I've rewritten it (I mostly changed everything but some lines remained the same) It's mostly a way for me to get over my writers block and explore different writing styles. So if it sounds awkward or clipped, you know why! Also if anyone wants to be my beta that'd be cool cause I can't always tell when things don't sound right or natural or just not in character.  
> song used is The People by Common.  
> also totally weird request but I decided to make a tumblr (again) and would like random people to follow so you can put in your url and i'll 99% of the time follow you.
> 
> sooo that new beyonce cd

*Louder, louder, louder, louder, louder, louder, louder, louder...*

It wasn’t the first time Beca’s been half asleep walking into class with a granola bar in her pocket and an empty backpack. She walks the distance of the classroom, her feet dragging to the only desk pushed against the back wall. It allows her a few feet at most from the other students. She opens her backpack, her routine settling in before she realises of course she left all her notebooks on her desk last night. She groans and presses her face against the cool of the desk. It’s been a long stressful day and it’s barely 8:02am. She should have slept before 4am but there was a tune stuck in her head and if she doesn’t comply to the beats, she’d drive herself insane.

 

She plugs her earphone connection into her cellphone and lets her mind wander before her teacher makes an appearance. She’s wishing she brought her huge headphones, her pride and joy, but instead she’s stuck with a decent pair of Bose running earphones. Not that she runs or sprints or walks quickly but they grip onto her ear better and have a clip which makes the possibility of an earbud popping out down to 0% which she’s ecstatic about. It’s a science one she’s got down to a T, keeping them hidden because she’s managed to put more effort in hiding her earphones than anything else which is a true testament to her beliefs. Music is her salvation, who needs meditation and God when you have the likes of Common, Immortal Technique, and Mos Def. It’s how she’s gotten through her life this far and so her hand reaches out tiredly toward the base of the chair. She wonders in amazement how she had even gotten out of bed this morning. Her eyes are still droopy and she feels the exhaustion gain way through her body as she slumps down for the dreadful hour.

 

The chair makes a strenuous noise, as if it’s about to collapse under her weight. Even through her headphones she can hear the tell tale noise. It reminds her of the heart from Edgar Allen Poe’s story. She’s most likely being dramatic but the noise makes her cringe. She despises the chair and everything it stands for but it guarantees her a spot. She sees herself in the chair. Which is saying a lot considering her hatred toward the chair increases slightly every day. Yeah, definitely, she's exaggerating.

 

But she won’t sit elsewhere, too afraid to make a fool of herself. Everyone knows who she is, what she means. She’s the child from a broken home with no hope and the attitude to rival even the most sarcastic of them. She’s the girl who dates the guys with no future because apparently that stigma sticks. She’s simply living up to the image people see of her. Her classmates have always assumed what her personality is because of her family or how she dresses.

 

People have always assumed the girl with the hypnotic eyes and captivating smile can’t possibly be intelligent. The girl who wears black must love rock or some sort of alternative music and so on. So Beca isn’t the girl with shattered dreams or the type to fuck guys who smoke or the type to listen to Rock, but it doesn’t matter because that’s all she’s ever been. Despite being none of it.

 

She’s got the attitude but it’s not a defensive mechanism or some sort of retaliation to her parents. It’s just her humour. It’s what makes her smile and laugh, she doesn’t mean the harsh comments. She’s joking but when her face doesn’t immediately form into a smile after such a blunt one liner, people assume. She’s the bitch. The girl who’s been hurt far too many times to have any shred of decency inside. No point in trying to convince people who have made up their minds a long time ago. So she continues with the dead pan and hopes one day someone will laugh despite the scowl on her face.

 

Her parents don’t laugh, just scold her for her humour. They say it’s rude and unrespectful, but who gives a fuck. Beca finds their behaviour appalling and intolerable. She sees the truth every time they argue then turn around and command her to speak to them in a pleasant tone.

 

Her parents have been yelling every night toward each other. Afterward they enter her room quietly as if she were a toddler. They sit on the edge of the bed and feed her lies as if she doesn’t know any different. They explain how love is about compromise and how sometimes you have to sacrifice a piece of yourself to make the relationship work. How love is hard work and not all dreams and fucking unicorns and all she can feel is shame. For her parents and for herself. She vows she will never compromise a piece of her own self, her own integrity, her own dreams for another person because that isn’t love. It just leads to hate and her parents are prime examples.  Once they’re gone and the door closes behind them she reaches for her headphones to drown out the words they’ve said all night. She hopes Common’s words on love push the misconstrued idea of love her parents are trying to push on her.

 

Her earphones are her prayers, it intensifies her emotions. When a good rapper spits a verse that makes her body fill with reverence she fills her body fill with a sort of joy that no other outlet has given her in her life. It’s more than a way she can zone out mentally in the words and beats. It’s the meaning behind everything. She focuses on the lyrics of the song and taps her fingers against the desk in tune with the beating of the clock. She can vaguely hear her health teacher talk about "sexting" and how it leads to heterosexual intercourse. She rolls her eyes at the heteronormativity and cranks up the music louder. She shouldn't be subjected to such blatant ignorance she reckons.

 

*Yeah, it's for the people *

*This is street ra-dio, for unsung heroes*

*Riding in they regal, trying to stay legal*

*My daughter found nemo, I found the new primo*

*Ya, you know how we do, we do it for the people*

 

She melds into the beats and eventually the tapping of her fingernails against the desk blends into the song blaring through her earphones. It’s the only indicator that she's sunk from reality to this otherworldly plane, where lyrics and beats find a rhythm. For anyone who knows Beca, they know she gets music. She can create layers of beats all on top of another that blend harmoniously. They know she's damn good at it too. They assume it's the beats that speak out to her. The constant tempo and timbre with its never ending thumping.

 

 

*And the struggles of the brothers and the folks*

*With lovers under dope, experiment to discover hopes*

*Scuffle for notes, the rougher I wrote, times were harder*

*Went from rocky starter to a voice of a martyr.*

 

Beca casts her eyes upward toward the board, her first mistake, and her eyes fall on the word, homosexual. It’s underlined and written in all caps. It’s just a word but at this moment it feels like a double edged knife. Nothing good could come of this and so her insides coil and she pauses her music. Her second mistake.

 

As soon as the music stops and the beats go away, a voice rings out. It's loud and affirmative, proud if nothing else. Her palms instantly get clammy.

“Um hello, homosexuals?”

She can’t seem to locate the owner of the voice. Which at the moment seems like her horrible luck.

 

 

"Thank you! I'm just saying, this class is totes catered to straight people, but what about gay people? Teaching ME to put a condom on won't help me if I'm into women!"

Beca's eyes go wide, searching for the voice. She glances around and can't seem to notice who the voice belongs to. She rubs her palms on her jeans and tilts her head every angle as slowly as she can as to not catch any attention.  She doesn’t need the be the girl gay as well. She doesn’t think she can make herself another generalisation because its supposed to fit. She might break if she has to shove more traits down her throat. She already feels like she’s bursting at the seams from all the titles that have been thrown at her.

 

*The karma of the streets is needs and takes*

*Sometimes we find peace in beats and breaks*

*Put the bang in the back so the seats can shake*

*Rebel Cadillac music for the people sake*

 

 

"Miss Beale, that's enough. Don't be so lewd, for now the condom is basic procedure... Most boys and girls are straight after all". He says it with a smirk, as if he can't fathom the idea of two girls having sex. Or two boys. Or two anything that isn't a man and a woman.

Beca's insides churn and she grips onto the desk. She casts her eyes downward and with a shaky hand reaches for the control so the music can drown out the feeling. She doesn't care who the voice belongs to, doesn't care if for once she might be able to find solace and understanding in a person. She isn’t that girl. She refuses to be that girl. She spends enough time in front of the mirror judging her outfit on how “gay” it is before leaving the house. She doesn’t want others to do the same toward her.

 

She doesn't care if the person who actively spoke out is gay, she's got her music. She's got Common. Who speaks to her and understands her. He knows her struggles and her willpower. Okay so maybe she isn't the intended audience for his music, maybe she's too white and too middle class. Maybe when he wrote about  "*inside peace mixed with beast seem to breed me*" he wasn't writing about Beca.

 

But she's listened to enough Hip-Hop to know that although she didn't have to deal with "the struggle" she's struggled. She's heard the lyrics repeated countless amount of times in different pitches mixed with different beats, Hip-Hop brings together different communities. The music may come from "foreign" people but the meaning isn't foreign, it's close to home.

 

So, Beca loses interest in reality again. She convinces herself it's for the best she never saw the person the voice belongs to. 

 

People have a way of disappointing you. Music doesn't.

 

 

* Visions realize, music affected lives*

*A gift from the skies, to be recognize*

*I'm keeping my eyes on the people, that's the prize*

 


	2. Double Standards

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chloe perspective  
> Song is Double Standards by AB-Soul ft. Anna Wise

*One time for your mind*

 

Her mind reels, attempts to sidestep the pitch in which her teacher is speaking to her with. She feels her blood run cold and looks around. Glances at the familiar faces. Those who laugh when Chloe goes off on rants again. The same people who make it a habit to get on her good side, not because of her temper. Because she's pretty. Because she's sweet and nice and gorgeous and lovely and a passive fucking female (she isn't but that's the generalisation, right?). It upsets her. How this world caters to certain people and yeah okay she's white but she doesn't take it for granted. She sees her white privilege and acknowledges it on a daily basis but she's still a female. A gay female and that also entitles her to bitching about being oppressed in some manner.

 

 

*Tired of living living living*

*By this double standard standard standard*

 

Anyone who knows Chloe, at least half-assed knows her, is aware that she isn't a violent person. She's not a rule breaker. She isn't a dangerous temperamental person, but even she has her limits. She's tired of being treated as a petty joke. Everyone expects her comments hurtling their way and they brush them off with practised ease.

"There's more than 2 genders

Asexuals exist

Being bisexual is a real thing.

Not everyone is CIS!"

They brush it off, because they know Chloe. Know she won't do anything about it beside try to enlighten people on the subjects and so when she pushes her chair back, the screeching of metal on the ground makes everyone pause and look in every direction except toward Chloe.

 

*My auntie told me always treat my lady right*

*My uncle told me only love 'em for a night*

*You can see the immediate disconnection*

*Between a man and a woman, the reason for regression.*

 

She picks her body off her seat and walks toward the door, slowly. Her heart is beating erratically and thumping within her chest, aware of her action. Her palms are clammy and she can't quite get a grip on the handle. She feels the panic bursting through her chest at a speed which she cannot contain. Her eyes zero in toward the door knob and her breath shortens.

She looks around helpless, afraid.

 

"Teaching me to put a condom on won't help if I'm into women!"

Did she just out herself?

 

She feels the bile build through her throat just as she pulls the door open and she sprints. Takes off, running from herself and her fears. Because even though everyone knows Chloe goes off on rants and protects all genders and sexualities.

No one knows Chloe is gay.

For all her pride of being a huge supporter of the LGBQTAI community, she was never a part of it.

That realisation makes Chloe run to her car and sink in her seat.

She can't believe it.

She's a hypocrite.

She was ashamed of being gay, felt that something was wrong with her and so she hated herself for it. She couldn't be here,  shouldn't be here, where everyone would know that she was too afraid to be labelled a lesbian.

 

She shifts her car down to first gear and highers the volume of Ab-Soul. Hip-Hop has been her constant.

 

If only she could find someone as constant as the beat of her favorite bars.

 

*See the moral of the story is, she a ho, he a pimp.*


	3. Music for Life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> song used is Music for Life by Hi-Tek. one of my favourites to be honest

*Music is my total distance, dawg, straight up*

*Everything in my life revolves around music*

 

One of the last things Beca remembers seeing before she blacks out is a flash of red sprinting down the hallway as the door closes. She remembers a loud shriek and a fist aiming straight for her face. Clearly the force and collision of the fist with her face is making her see things. It reminds her of a scene from those crappy horror films.

 

Okay so maybe she's embellishing. She saw a blur heading toward her face. Of course it collides with her face. She's not athletic after all. She saw it coming. Not the punch, the fact that she wouldn't have the necessary reflexes to dodge it. 

 

 

 

She doesn't remember upsetting anyone... so, okay, yeah, why'd she just get punched?

 

*It's like, you can't get a relationship 'cuz*

 *I'm still with my first love, which is music.*

 

She wakes up laying on a stiff board, what the nurse in her school calls a bed. She's surrounded by an off white. It makes her uneasy. Does the colour even have a name? Off white, what does that mean? Not quite white but not quite other colours?

No one is in sight so she hops off the bed, too confident in her body and reflexes, nearly collapsing. She sticks her hand out toward the floor and aids her fall. Her head is throbbing and the music blaring through her earphones isn't helping at the moment. She smiles and almost chuckles. Almost... but the bass from her earphones is on time with the pounding in her skull. If her music is still on then she's done a fantastic job of hiding her earphones from plain view. She grins through the pain at her feat. +5 intellect for Beca. Stop playing video games, she chastises herself.

 

Her fingers hover over the pause button on her headphones and she weighs the pros and cons before she turns off the music hesitantly and shudders.

 

It sounds ridiculous, she’s aware, but living without the music on is weird. Not unbearable, but weird. It's been such a constant fixture since she was a teenager. Music through sleep, classes, driving, shower etc. It's become elevator music in a way but still so much more important than the every day things. More important than her father whose track record has one too many "skips". More important than her mother with her shrilly voice and constant clubbing, more important than the money she can count on that's left atop the counter for her source of food.

 

She rests on the floor, afraid to stand up and pulls her knees to her chest. She doesn't trust her legs or her own body at the moment. It's been betraying her all day. From getting knocked out to pausing her music in the first place just because some random girl spoke out against homophobia.  Beca places her head on her knees and rolls her head, hoping the pressure will alleviate the horrible migraine and her mistakes from the earlier day. It's a constant buzz, a fixated throb and beat.

She tries to place a tune to the pain.

 

*It started with rhythms I heard listenin' to the wall*

 *The bouncing of basketballs on playgrounds and all*

 *The empty bottles this hollow wind blowin' inside 'em*

 *The flow and rhythm got my alignment to a science*

 

It's how her entire life has gone on. Adding music to the pain.

 

*What I noticed was pure music, untampered with*

 

The door opens and someone steps in, she can't open her eyes due to the pain and so she squeezes her head with her palms and tries not to make sound. A part of her is aware a murderer could have entered the room but she doesn't care. She wants the pain to cease. All of the pain.

 

Her head throbs once rapidly, not on time with the others and stops just as quickly. Of course she would notice that. How the throb didn’t match to the beat of the others. Even in pain she finds the music. The ache is silenced and she looks upward. Sees the nurse and tries to smile, she notes it might have come off as a scowl. It usually does. She assumes her face just doesn't have the necessary muscles to smile properly, or at least that's the lie she feeds to her parents when they demand her to smile. Her eyes continue rolling upward, no longer fixated on the nurse and Beca tries to zero in on the nurse but can't seem to.

 

Her vision is blurry and is jumping from object to object. She sees the ceiling and wonders how she didn't notice that there were dots placed on the ceiling before she feels a harsh blow on the back of her head. She falls unconscious again.

 

*My whole life, man, is really music*

*Through my bass line, I'm livin' through it*

 

She wakes up and notices a boy around her age staring at her. 

 

"Oh! You're awake. Oh god. You're awake. Do I call a nurse? A doctor? Are you okay? Do you need something?" His voice is laced with panic.  She doesn't remember ever meeting this kid and it's upsetting her. Why is he even here? She flinches at his every question and moves her hand to where the remote on earphone dangles to push play on her music but finds herself grasping at air.

 

*Another expressive of life, I couldn't live without*

 *I like my music straight, pure, not watered down*

 

The boy runs out of the room, almost tripping on his own shoelaces and she snorts before her eyes shut and her world goes black.

 

*When I'm stressed out, it's my sanity*

 

The next time she awakens the boy is there again, on his phone, sobbing. Actually crying, snot and all. She can't help but roll her eyes at the picture.

She's aware she should be full of concern, but she's not and she's really wishing she'd black out again, but it isn't happening. She sighs a little too drastically for her own taste and manages to capture his attention. He rapidly taps his screen and slides his phone into his pocket. Briefly wipes his tears and begins to open his mouth.

 

"Before you talk, I'm okay. I don't need a nurse and can you please leave my room? Jesus dude you're creeping me out." The words leave her mouth before her brain filter has gone out and she sees his eyes widen.

 

"You don't remember?" She rolls her eyes again and fixates her vision on the picture in front of her. It's some abstract art, with cubes and triangles. It's abstract, right? Or cubism maybe. She can't really focus on her art lessons and it isn't until she sees a blur from the corner of her that she snaps back to reality. 

 

"Did you not listen to me?! This is like this movie I saw once where---" he prattles a little too quickly and a little too animatedly, at least when it comes to movies.

 

Beca can't help but scoff. "DUDE! Make it short. I don't care for the rest." She tilts her head in the opposite direction so she doesn't have to see his eyes. They remind her of Bambi, child-like and lively. She doesn't want to be the one to tell him the world is a cruel place but she also can't stand to be the nice guy (well girl)

 

*It's like music, it was for me man, it means, it means everything, family*

 *You know when we going through, our personal strifes in life*

 *You know what I'm sayin', we get up in that studio *

 *Close that door, we lockin' ourselves in, that little four-wall space, man*

 

"Jessie, which is actually a funny story. My actual name is Jessica, I mean, I know... a guy with a name like Jessica, can't believe my parents, but there's guys with names like Ashley!"

 

Beca drags her hands through her hair and tries to control her body. She's got the urge to grab him by his collar and pummel him. She's pretty sure she said "short" as in little to no details. How is he going off on a tangent with a name. A fucking name. Before she knows it, he's giggling. Not laughing... Giggling.

 

"---so that's why my name is Jessica!!!" He doubles over in fits of laughter and manages to gain some semblance of control over his body before he catches her eyes.

 

She lifts one eyebrow and mentally smacks herself. A full on blow. 

"Okay, Jessica. Here's the deal. Tell me why you're here, in my room, waiting for me to wake up. IN ONE SENTENCE and afterward if you find yourself leaving my room, I won't object" She's aware her voice has gone hoarse toward the end and so it comes off slightly meaner than she intended but she can't apologise now. She's in too deep already and she really just wants to find out what the fuck is happening.

 

He opens his mouth a few times, on the verge of speaking before he closes if swiftly. It happens a few more times before he finally says.

"I hit you with my chair and you blacked out because my best friend Chloe ran out of class because she's gay and I didn't mean to do it and it was an accident and I'm so sorry and I feel horrible and---"

He's cut short when she slaps her hand over his mouth.

 

"Adding the word "and" doesn't it make one sentence, dick. Now scram." She scoffs and retracts her hand. She makes a show to wipe it against the bed with a face of disgust.

 

"What's your name?"

 

*Get up in that vocal booth and become whoever you wanna be*

 *Express what you wanna feel*

 *You can speak through the music*

 *Music is for life*


End file.
